Survivors
by tarahasatardis
Summary: One girl is found alive out of the hundred the demons had kept. Dean, Sam, and Castiel use her to uncover what's really going on, what it means when she says she's number ninety-four, how she knew Cas was an angel, and why she tried to get them out before the demons found him. When they unearth the horror, one question remains. What are the consequences of surviving?
1. Chapter 1

I had been with them for a while now, the Winchester brothers, and I think I had helped them a great deal. Maybe not as much as they helped me, but I like to think there were a few times when they wouldn't have made it out of a hunt alive if I hadn't been there. Of course, they probably risked themselves more than usual now, knowing that there was someone else in the world looking out for them other than each other.

"Maybe you did it on purpose." Sam's hypothesis stung like a djin's needle. I looked from him to Dean, but Dean wasn't looking at me. He was sighing into the corner of the room, clearly convinced by his brother.

"How could you think that?!" I was appalled. After all we had been through together. It was as if, from the beginning… "You've been waiting for this. The whole time. This whole freaking time!" My eyes started to well up as my heart sank lower. I know, I hate it, but I cry when I'm angry or frustrated.

Dean's resigned look to the floor confirmed it for me, and I couldn't help it anymore, and my tears betrayed me. But as betrayed as I felt by my own body, Sam and Dean not trusting me, after all this time, seemed like a much bigger betrayal.

I remembered back to when I first met them, and how it had been completely reversed. I didn't trust them at all, these strangers who go around saving people they never knew, and probably would never see again, risking their own lives every time. What was in it for them? Why were they doing it? When they first came to me, the first ones I saw being Dean and Castiel, I thought they were part of the crew that held me and the others captive, come to take me to my death at last.

But that's probably not how they saw it.

~ § ~

"Dean, get the door!" Two more demons found their heads full of white light before they collapsed onto the floor, dead. Castiel got up and rushed over to the hunter picking the lock on the next set of doors. If he was human, or maybe just incompetent, Castiel might have lost track of all the doors they had already come through. Surely, these were the last. "Dean, this is taking too long. Move aside." Dean jerked back as the angel knocked down the heavy wooden slabs into splinters, and followed him inside. Being careful as always, because backstabbing demons love hiding in corners and shadows, always ready to jump you if you don't get them first, Dean noticed this room was different from the others as he pushed aside lavish curtains draped onto the floor. The harsh red velvet matched the rest of the rooms décor, which was significantly more than the previous broken down rooms and hallways. What was so special about this room? Besides the disemboweled blonde lying in a pool of her own blood on the extravagant mahogany bed in the center of the room. Still ready to stab a demon in the throat, Dean moved over to the bed, lifting the satin comforter to glance under the bed until he was satisfied the room was clear of filth. Finally sheathing the demon knife, he stood up over the prone figure of the bloody girl lying atop the sheets. There was no _way_ she was still alive under all that blood, but he checked for a pulse anyway. No luck, she was definitely –

"Dean. You might want to see this." Dean turned to look in the direction of Castiel's voice, and spotted what he meant right away. Wiping the blood covering his fingers onto his jeans, Dean walked over to the other side of the room where Castiel was standing over a heap of blankets on the floor in the corner. Twisted in the rags was a girl.

Dean knelt down while the angel took to look out position, and checked for a strangers pulse in as many seconds. Luckily, she had one. Moving her hair that looked like it had been darkened by lack of sunlight, he opened her eyes to check her pupil dilation. The hazel browns and greens around her pupil grew larger as her eyes were introduced to the dim lighting. Good. Movement alerted Dean, but it was only the girls arm, lying on top of her hip bone, which was a bit more prominent then it should have been, as it could be seen through her periwinkle silk nightgown. Her skin was unhealthy in ways that must have been caused by lack of water and proper hygiene, and a severe nutrient deficiency.

As she woke up from Deans checking of her vitals, she acted like she knew him, or at least knew why he was there. After her eyes had adjusted and settled upon his face, she said, "Come to take me away? She must have died rather quickly if it's my turn already." She attempted to get up, but she was so weak that it looked like the effort hurt her, and Dean wondered for a second why she even tried before he put an arm under her shoulders to help her. She seemed a little startled at this, like she hadn't at all expected assistance, but she quickly had her expression under control. When she started walking though, Dean had to redirect her to the door where their look out was watching, because the girl was aiming them in the wrong direction; the bed. When they got to the door, she was still looking back at the dead girl. "I thought you would have taken care of her body before you woke me. Is there another bed prepared?" She asked with a resigned sadness in her eyes.

Dean had to speak up. "I'm not one of the bad guys you know." A smile touched her mouth without touching her eyes. "Yeah, like I haven't heard that one before. All you guards are the same. I wonder if he knows what you do to us while he's having his fun." At this, Dean had to stop her at the door and put a hand on both of her arms to hold her up. "I'm really not one of those sons of bitches. I'm not a guard, I'm not a demon, and I'm not an asshole." He ignored the mocking sigh behind him. "We're here to save you, and anyone else who's still human in here." She looked at him like she thought this was the least funny joke she had ever heard, until she looked confused and asked "We?" Then she looked behind Dean to see Castiel looking up and down the hallway.

She screamed. Dean nearly dropped her in his panic to cover her mouth and shut her up. Shit. Any remaining demons would have heard that for sure. Dean turned. "A little help, Cas?" The angel turned towards him. "I'm not sure that would be wise." Dean looked strained at holding the girls scream in and craning his neck. "CAS. NOW." And Castiel laid a hand on the girl to quiet her. There was a little flash of light on her arm where Castiel held her, and then she felt too hot to touch for a second, and Dean almost let go of her completely.

She had stopped screaming, but she was staring at Cas like she couldn't fathom why he was here. Then she looked frantically at Dean. "Is he an angel? Why would you bring an angel here? You need to run. Go. If they get him, he's dead. Worse than dead. They'll take your grace," she whispered, turning to Castiel. "They'll take it and they'll shred it."

She was cut off when Dean scooped her up into his arms and motioned for Cas to lead on. "Sure. Awesome. Cas can handle a couple of demons. But we are getting out of here. Cas, do you know where Sam is?" The girl was about to respond, but she was cut off both by a spell of nausea and the sound of heavy footsteps from down the hall. Cas looked ready to stab a bitch, but when Sam came bounding around the corner, he relaxed. But Sam sure as hell didn't. "What the hell is he doing here, Dean? I told you he shouldn't be here!"

"Forget it, Sam. How did you find us?" Dean looked around the corner to be sure Sam wasn't followed. "I heard screaming. I thought it might be one of the girls. Hopefully still alive." Dean looked up. "Wait, does that mean you found others?" Sam nodded, but didn't look at Dean. His gaze fell to the girl in Dean's arms. "Yeah. Yeah, I did. We need to get out of here, now." Dean and Cas followed Sam as he started jogging away. "Sam, wait, what did you find? Any survivors?"

The last thing the girl heard before slipping into unconsciousness in the arms of an escaping Winchester was Sam breathing out, "No, Dean. No survivors."


	2. Chapter 2

"BUT I WAS NUMBER NINETY-FOUR! THERE WERE AT LEAST SIX MORE, WHY DIDN'T YOU SAVE TH-" The girl's ranting was abruptly cut off when Castiel simultaneously apprehended her and applied two fingers to her forehead to incapacitate her. There was no flash of light or heat this time.

As Castiel handed her body off to Dean and muttered something about checking a lead before fluttering off, Dean managed to get her body into what he hoped was a comfortable position on the backseat of the Impala before turning to look up at Sam.

It was unfortunate that she had woken up, especially in her state of exhaustion and confusion and whatever else, but at least they were no longer within earshot of the demon compound. "What does she mean she was number ninety-four? Did they take that many fleshbags to possess? Seems a little excessive." Sam didn't respond. He just walked around the trunk until he reached the passenger side door, halted, and leaned against the roof of the car with his elbows, and laced his fingers together in front of his forehead. Dean closed the backseat door, careful not to catch one of the girl's feet, and stood opposite Sam. "What do you think, Sammy?"

Looking his brother straight in the eye, Sam talked in hushed tones. "I don't think they were using them as bodies to possess. I think it was a lot worse than that. Much worse than we thought going in. And she was ninety-four out of one hundred. I think being so close to the end is how she stayed alive long enough for you to find her." Sam dropped his head down against his hands again, clearly contemplating some of that psychological bullshit that he was so into. Dean wasn't going to ask about that, though.

"How do you know it was out of one hundred?" He almost didn't want to know. Almost. No matter how gruesome it was, it still might help him work the case, and that's what was important. Sam paused before he responded. "Because I saw the cells. I saw the list. And I killed the guards." Looking at Dean to see his shocked expression, Sam felt he had to justify his actions. "They deserved it, Dean. You didn't see what they did to all those girls, it was awful how they had to live, only to end up…what they _did-"_

"I get it, Sam. Shit was fucked up. How many were there?"

Sam took a moment to breathe. "From what I understand, the cells held 100 girls in the beginning. Then the guards would go down the list, and take one at a time to wherever- I think that room you guys found the girl in- and when the girls were dead, they would take the body, dump it in a cell, and cross the name off the list. When I got there, there was one cell filled with the dead bodies they hadn't gotten rid of, and in another cell… the guards were in that one. They just killed one of the girls when I…"

Sam let that sink in. When Dean's face stopped showing emotion and went back to his normal mask, Sam continued. "But the thing is, I think the guards new something was going down. That they weren't going to have to finish the list. Either that or they got lazy and crossed off names before they were sure the girls were dead. Maybe they prematurely crossed off their intended victims."

Dean was pretty composed, even as he thought about how the girl was so ready to die, to be led to her death by anyone who walked in. "What makes you say that?"

Sam glanced at the backseat of the Impala. After opening the passenger door, he stood there, staring at nothing as he answered his brother.

"All of the names were crossed off. All one hundred. And she said there should be 6 remaining, right? Cuz she was ninety-four, and there should have been six more girls in line, alive. But they weren't. The guards had seen to that, in many creative ways. Even _her_ name was crossed off. 94, Brooke. I took it with me, but it's only first names. They probably thought she would die, or they planned to take care of it when we interrupted."

Sam swung into the car, resting in his seat as he closed the door and waited for the driver to join him.


	3. Chapter 3

"I think it's time we had a talk."

I caught a glimpse of Dean's face as he came over to wear I sat hunched on the end of the bed with my knees pulled up and my arms around them, mercilessly tight. As he eased himself down next to me, I looked away. I watched the droplets splashing continuously down the drain of the leaky sink. I noticed how old the tv was, yet how shiny the new Keurig machine looked as it sat on the counter next to enamel colored overturned mugs. I looked at anything that wasn't Dean's concerned gaze. I knew this would come. I had been dreading it. And I kind of knew he planned to ask me today, even before his encouraging opener. When he sent Sam away to the {insert shitty town} library and told him not to even think about coming back without some decent food, I could tell he was preparing the scene, setting me up for a comforting interrogation.

"I didn't think you were capable of having talks. You made fun of Sam for attempting to have chick flick moments like three times since I met you." But he knew I was trying to avoid it, so he jumped right in. No dancing around the sensitive topics, I guess.

"Yeah, well, that's different. Some shit can just pile up in a dark little basement that you never go in. Some shit is buried for a reason. And I get that you would want to bury your own crap and never mention it again, but that sucks for you, cuz I gotta know your personal hell in order to get the bad guys that are responsible for it."

I nestled my head on my knees and hid behind my arms. "I know." I whispered. And I did know. And I did want to help. But that doesn't mean I wanted to open up and sing about my shame to the world. Which, honestly, would have been easier than telling Dean, sitting here all quiet and calm.

I decided I would answer whatever he asked, because I knew how much he thought he needed to know, and I wouldn't be able to convince him or Sam that any information I had wouldn't really help. And I knew he wouldn't give up. But I thought maybe I could just answer his questions without giving too much up. It was stupid, but I did care what they thought of me, and they held enough pity for me without me adding any more reasons for them to sneak worried glances at me when they thought I wouldn't notice. "What do you wanna know?"

"Well, to pinpoint our search in disappearances, you could tell us how long you were there." He got up from the bed to move some things aside in his duffle until he found what he was after. With a pen and a notebook in hand, he sat back down and looked at me expectantly. I barely registered the bed shifting under his weight. I was drawing a blank. "I… I don't know. I hadn't really thought about how long I'd _been _there, just focused on when I'd get _out_. Uhm, what's today?"

Tearing his gaze away from me, Dean looked at his watch. "Thursday. May 18th."

"That can't be right. I thought it was much longer than that. The last I remember, before… it was just after my birthday, February 27th. I guess it was only a couple of months. No, but that doesn't fit. Do you think lost sense of time, or reality? Cuz I really thought it was a lot longer." In my confusion, I let down my guard, releasing my legs from the death grip I had maintained, leaving red areas under my knees from the pressure.

"Uh, from what Sam told me about that place, I wouldn't be surprised if you had lost all your senses. Especially if you were there that long. But you can chat it up with Sam about psycho effects later. How well did you know the other girls? Could you recognize them if we showed you missing posters?" He asked while he scribbled something down on the notepad. The paper was all yellowed and bent in a few corners, and it's aged beyond it's years appearance reminded me of the man who was writing in it. When I didn't answer him right away, he looked up and his hand tapped the pen against his thigh.

"Well, yeah, I could identify some of them, but we tried not to get too close, I mean, we only thought about making friends and getting to know other girls close to our number so that… you know…"

"Not really, no. Kinda why I'm asking." His brow was all pinched together like he was trying to figure out a puzzle by only looking at the pieces, all scattered and mangled, and he wanted to touch them to try and see it any fit together.

I pulled my feet close on the bed and stared at them. "So it wouldn't hurt as much. When they were taken from us screaming, and didn't come back. If you were only friends with, say, number ninety-three and ninety-five, then when ninety-three died, you only had to be sad a little while, and you didn't have to be sad for ninety-five. I guess that didn't really stop us though, huh?" I gave a weak smile in Dean's direction, but it fell flat. He stared at my incredulously. Then, with honest ignorance, he asked "Why?"

"Because you never had to see ninety-five taken away. And with ninety-three, well, you didn't have much time to be sad, cuz you were next."


End file.
